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I'll ask you a question: under what standard do people judge what is considered "good writing"? That is the standard which I am applying to this story, and pretty much any other which I respect. Frankly, the Medaka Box fanbase is the only one which has ever given me shit for attempting to do so, I can only think that says something about the audience.

Good writing is judged depending on the context of the writing. In this case I'd ask "does this entertain me?" that's good enough for me. Regardless of anything we say or do the story will go however Nisio says it'll go, anything we say here is a guess at best (even if all of the signs say to turn left he can always turn right). Some will be right and some wrong, either way the story still enteratains me so it's good enough.

Tl;dr: Medaka and Zen are going to end up toguether, regardless of how many paragraphs written on internet forums in favor of them splitting up being the objectively best path in the story.

It's most likely going to happen, one way or the other.
And I don't even like them, I'm hardcore shipping Zenami right now, but Zenkichi and Medaka are still, by far, the most likely pairing to happen.

~~~

Spoiler for Tenchi:

leaving party prepartions a competition if Medaka fails she'll stay in the school against her or her fathers will, these obstacles were presented by Aijimu as a joke

Spoiler:

This sounds so incredibly boring. It would be a perfect time to focus on the new council, student politics and Zenkichi's change, Nishio. Urgh.

leaving party prepartions a competition if Medaka fails she'll stay in the school against her or her fathers will, these obstacles were presented by Aijimu as a joke

Spoiler:

This sounds so incredibly boring. It would be a perfect time to focus on the new council, student politics and Zenkichi's change, Nishio. Urgh.

Are there any more in-depth spoilers I could read, guys? Thanks.

Spoiler:

Courtesy of 4chan:
>Medaka's looking at a piece of paper. On it, it's the quiz for finding the location of the farewell party.
>1st question: Among living things, those who move are called animals ("animals" is written "moving things" in japanese).
>The second question was about the frequency of leap years or something.
>By extracting a numeric formula out of the answers you are able to find some figure representing the party location.
>"Is this revenge for my orienteering?" she says bitterly while entering a classroom... and no one is there.
>Medaka: "Oh, so the surprise is that there is no surprise?". However she notices something is written on the blackboard.
>-Medaka + Shiranui = Zenkichi
>Anshinin = (The spoilers guy doesn't remember what's written there since it's too many charcaters)
>Medaka solves the problem, and it's the clock tower. Zenkichi is at the entrance near a desk he prepared.
>Medaka: "I thought you used the problem to buy time... instead it seems you wanted to force me to take a specific route".
>Zenkichi: "That's right, this is where it starts". He explains these thing were prepared back when the school was still called Black Box Cram School as a joke by Ajimu and its called (the spoilers guy doesn't remember this clearly either it's 百輪送 or 百輪走 "one hundred leaps run or something).

>Back then, after entering a private school, you were treated like a runaway ninja. So, after after having survived 100 assassinations attempts, you were given a farewell party. However, since it's impossible to survive that, it was scrapped.
>However, since it' Medaka-chan, this seems reasonable. the timelimit it's up to the end of school day (6 p.m.) So it's 90 minutes.
>Rules are simple. Within the time limit, collect 100 flower brooches attached to 100 elite individuals. Third years are still partecipating in this. We also called some special guest from outside.If you fail, as a penalty you must go tell your father that you want to remain in this school.
>Zenkichi: "There are lots of people who want you to ramain here you know..."
>Medaka: "What about you?"
>Zenkichi: "I don't really want you to remain here so" He enters his fighting stance and sprints towards Medaka. "that would be kind of shameful, do you not agree?"
>Medaka: "I don't." She hits Zenkichi hard.
>Zenkichi: "And now we must part agian... Thanks for everything, these past 14 years were simply really happy." He sees her off with tears in his eyes.
>Medaka enters the next clasroom. She finds a bunch of named guys (Hirado, Hinata and others). "So you start with the small fish first?"
>Medaka: "There are no small fish in this school!" She enters End God mode and the chapter ends with Kurokami Final.

Honestly, the setup for this arc sounds pretty damn tedious and disappointing.

Yeah, it's just too similar to be anything but intentional. It's like two chapters of Phoenix Wright, both having you defend a guy with the same occupation, but each going in highly different routes. I'm sure of it.

This can't be a curb-stomp, as it would not end a chapter. Then again, who can understand the mind of the reclusive author, Nisio (if that is his real name).

I have been reading all these comments so I had to join. This is for Sol. I know you claim that medaka's love for zen is based on "dependancy" since he gave her a purpose and you might be right. So I decided to browse some chapters to see if I could find kumagawa's reason for his love. What I realized is that his love is no different from medaka's love based on his graduation speech. His comment about how he was worried that without medaka and ajimu he could go back to his old self seems like him being dependant on her. His love could be based on this. Only difference is he did realize that he didnt need her but by his reaction when she came back shows that he really does love her. His love is now genuine but if you say that his love was always genuine then there is no reason why medakas love isnt genuine either.

As for medaka and zen I believe that they need to break up or stay apart for a bit see if they really love each other. Now for the rest of you guys do you think zen would have rejected medaka if it wasnt for the teacher? Sorry I typed this at work.

Yeah, it's just too similar to be anything but intentional. It's like two chapters of Phoenix Wright, both having you defend a guy with the same occupation, but each going in highly different routes. I'm sure of it.

This can't be a curb-stomp, as it would not end a chapter. Then again, who can understand the mind of the reclusive author, Nisio (if that is his real name).

You said it, bro.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kinali

Now for the rest of you guys do you think zen would have rejected medaka if it wasnt for the teacher?

Of course.

Kuguhara's speech was more about if they should or not force Medaka to stay by begging her, something Zenkichi decided he'd do only if leaving was something Medaka herself honestly didn't want to do, which is why he said he was relieved at her feelings, since then he'd no longer have to force her to stay.
Zenkichi's speech was rather about the fact that she's not going to be the sole reason for him to live anymore, alot along those lines, which was his reason for him rejecting her.

If I had to speculate, I'd say that this change in him is something that started right before his fight with Iihiko, went through deeply when he was thinking about his life after that fight, and culminated in chapter 186.

My primary reason for rooting for Kumagawa x Medaka is due to Kumagawa's continually expressed interest in the relationship. As a fan of Kumagawa, I have no choice but to pay attention to one of the most recurrent aspects of his characterization.

There is a great deal of weight to Kumagawa's feelings for Medaka (and at times, Medaka's feelings for Kumagawa in return; their joy of finally arriving at the battle they had waited 300,000,000 years for remains one of the most memorable aspects for me of the climax of the Minus arc). Having lost to Medaka then, assimilated into the Student Council, being reduced to just another one of Medaka's endless friends/enemies, leaves those feelings unresolved. Initially you could have just assumed that Kumagawa buried them quietly, offscreen, embracing his new personality and forgetting that those developments in the Minus Arc ever happened. This was my initial attitude as well. However, the persistent resurfacing of Kumagawa's romantic emotions for Medaka show that this is not the case. In the end, nearly all (actually, pretty much all) of Kumagawa's moments of being 'real' (dropping the brackets) after the end of the Minus arc still have to do with Medaka (whether saying he would beat her, that she would return to him, or 'achieving' his first victory). So you can clearly see that Medaka was and still is necessary to the resolution of Kumagawa's arc.

Or Medaka is essential to a number of people's arcs as the protagonist?

I don't really think it's "persistent romantic emotions", but more the relationship of being defined by their enemies, the whole "valuing enemies more" thing. I may be harping on semantics, but I think these relationships can be defined as more than pairings.

While you do point out instances of Kumagawa's development relating to Medaka, it seems automatically tempered towards romance in your view, which I do think is a stretch. What does he really love about Medaka? Is it just attributed to the illogical, instinctual aspect of love isn't really explainable?

Delving into personal reasons, one of my misgivings about the pairing is that it's a bit too...blatant for me. The whole "opposites attract" without much else makes it feel more like some predestined relationship than genuine development. Of course, being her main opposition Kumagawa has ironically given Medaka some of her happiest moments, but they may hold different weights to people.

You know what, why hasn't anyone really talked about Medaka having a harem? Or perhaps I haven't been reading the right forums.

If there were no understandable standard for what could be meant by "good writing", nobody would use the term. The fact that people exist who consider "good writing" a thing means that there's some commonly understood meaning for it. Now try to guess what it is.

Umm no, as you might have noticed the highest rated say films in say metacritic are different from the highest rated films from the general public. There's is no absolute rule in regards to good writing. Heck wjhat is commonly referred to good writing truly good writing is something the reader cannot easily predict or produces unforsee emotions or concept, that the reader didn't have prior to reading or watching the literature.

It's actually quite laughable your judging shit by good writing writings as if it's some universal thing. Just because you agreed with the majority a few times there will always be instances where you don't, that's means your sense of good writings don't mean shit, as that sort of thing isn't consistent. You judge it by what you like, if that opinion is common then the book is considered good but that doesn't mean it's always will be common. Not all critics rate the same things as highly s oher there will ALWAYS be disparity that's why being a critic isn't about holdingup to some silly universal standard as good writing but being able to make complelling arguments to to why to beliee what you do about a particular story.